..Reke had 8.4 attempts at the rim. This year it’s 5.2. You can tell Reke is getting to the rim less because his FTA is way down from last year. Way way down.

I dont know if you are including me in “everyone”, but I see no quick fix. I do see a team that has shown little progress for 82 games, and it concerns me that it is going to be a constant rather than the valley before climbing to a peak.

Omri averages 7.5 shots a game and 4 of those are 3pters. Omri’s shooting 40% from 3 and Donte 31%, and both of them are shooting better than Tyreke who also takes three 3’s per game and is shooting 29%. And, when you get 7 shots a game and half or almost half are from 3’s where 34-39% is a good rate, your going to have a low shooting percentage especially if the team isn’t running any plays for you.

The other thing to remember is that there really isn’t very much difference between Omri’s .428 FG% and Dontes .390. Adjusted for total shots taken Donte would have only had to hit 5 more shots to have the same 42.8% shooting. and, the same would be true about the 3pt shooting, only 5 shots difference.

Of all the players who’ve taken more then 10 3pt attempts only Omri, Cisco (37%) and Luther (32%) shoot better than Donte. One point on Donte’s 3’s is that unlike Omri and Garcia, who take a lot of corner 3’s, Donte’s 3’s come more out top FT line extended. I don’t know if this is his preferred spot or if he’s asked to shot further out because he’s asked to get back on defense.

These guys aren’t running basic NBA plays well, and you want them to try & figure out how to do more complicated plays?

to be honest I am a little confused by what you are trying to say. Maybe I need more coffee.

The players or the coach?

Color me skeptical.

Well duh.

How do we know that they can’t runs simple plays? And what kind of simple plays are we talking about?

Like initiating the offense quickly for one thing. Guys stand around and look at each other for a long time. It’s a consistent issue with this group. I wish I knew the fix to this, but a lot of will be maturity and player understanding that movement is imperative to winning at the NBA level.

Nothing I’ve seen suggests that commitment or understanding is there for these young players yet.

The bigger portion of last year roster, and the core of the team has remained the same. As a coach, shouldn’t you be able to have a good view on that group’s abilities and inabilities, strengths and weaknesses? And then, shouldn’t you implement an offense that fits those (in)abilities and strengths/weaknesses?

I agree with this. The question: What strengths does this team show on a consistent basis that you would be willing to hang your hat on? That’s the problem again: Youth is inconsistent, and worse, quite often unreliable. Welcome to rebuilding at the NBA level. This isn’t Maccabi where you can buy some high quality Balkan, Russian or American talents and win the EuroLeague this year. It’s not all about how rich you are at the NBA level (although that doesn’t hurt either).

It is easy to lay the blame at the feet of the players and their inexperience. And I’m sure that there is truth to it. But PW knew he got a rebuilding job, and I would expect him to have a plan n place and coax a better performance out of the players, not the general regression we see now. And I’m not even mentioning the constant lineup changes, JT at the 3, players going from started to DNP-CD and the short experiment with becoming a defense-first team.

It is easy to lay the blame of this team on the inexperience and the youth of these players. It’s also the correct answer in this case. It’s why I keep saying it. I’m not just spouting off bullshit to be contrary because the anti-PW crowd pisses me off Rik.

Tyreke, JT, Greene, and Casspi all have a bit more experience. Cisco and Landry (relative veterans) have been with the team since the off-season, and Dalembert is another veteran presence. Granted, DMC is an important cog and a rookie, but that is not enough to explain the general lack of progress.

Yes, they all have more experience. What they need to really do is become better players with consistent traits that make the Kings better. That hasn’t been evident and that’s the difficulty of rebuilding. You’ll notice it when it happens.

I’ll tell you what Rik. I’m not unhappy with various things that have happened. The lanes get packed for Reke every time he drives now because NBA players have A) adjusted and B) coaches have maintained that beating the Kings quite often comes to keeping Reke out of the lane.

To be honest, I think Omri Casspi’s and Donte Greene’s progress has been decent up to this point. I don’t think they’ve regressed to the point where they are disappointments to this team. Or at least I’m not disappointed with either of them. Then again, they are role players too.

DeMarcus Cousins was thought to be a star, and to the chagrin of many, they are noticing why some were mentioning that DMC wasn’t a finished product. He’s not. Quality players like DMC can take time to adjust to the NBA. When he does, and he’s showing signs of it already, it will mean better things for the Kings.

Tyreke Evans is struggling with that A) every team has taken away his strengths and forced him to play to more of his weaknesses. He has never faced tougher players or coaches on a nightly basis. He’s struggling with this. It’s no secret this is why some felt that Tyreke was a risk to begin with because of his natural first instinct is to score. There is nothing wrong with Tyreke that isn’t fixable with time. But, the key word here is time.

Don’t lecture me on where Paul Westphal is responsible for Tyreke’s recognition to make the offense run A) faster or B) get the ball to guys in spots where they can be effective. DMC needs to learn how to get his shots against players that A) more athletic he is and B) more experienced. This is a problem for any team when they have so many young players. What’s the fix? TIME!

You want to blame Westphal for inserting Head into the lineup for defensive reasons, or playing JT at the 3, go ahead. I didn’t agree with either of those moves. It makes easier to criticize him. If anything, I think PW has been far too aware of his critics and tried to appease them. My general view of this is you tell your critics to go fuck themselves and sit on a 10 foot pole and rotate on it until they get it. Then again, I’m not likely to be a NBA head coach any time soon either.

At least, anything that means anything. But it’s all good.